1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to content browsing over a computer communications network and more particularly to content browser selection for browser compatibility.
2. Description of the Related Art
Content distribution depends heavily upon the electronic distribution of content over the global Internet. The World Wide Web (the “Web”) provides the principal conduit through which content is distributed and the venerable content browser serves as the low cost tool for requesting, retrieving and rendering content over the Web. Content distributed over the Web generally includes markup formatting embedded presentable elements such as text, graphics, video or audio. The hypertext markup language (“HTML”) has always been the preferred language for markup formatting presentable elements in content. Most commercially distributed content browsers handle HTML formatted content uniformly.
Content distributed over the Web, however, has progressed from mere static pages to full-blown user customizable applications. To achieve the advanced presentation of content over the Web, several additional technologies have become part and parcel of content delivery strategies. Those technologies include dynamic HTML (“DHTML”), cascading style sheets (“CSS”), embedded scripts such as those comporting with the javascript specification, to name only a few. Unlike HTML, however, most conventional content browsers handle portions of CSS and javascript differently. Thus, inherent browser incompatibilities drive content developers to limit the use of these additional technologies only to those aspects uniformly handled across different content browsers.
Content developers seeking to capitalize upon Web 2.0 mechanisms do not have the luxury of omitting important features of CSS and javascript to ensure uniform treatment of content across different content browsers. Consequently, content developers rely upon existing tools for ensuring the use of a particular content browser when rendering specific content. For example, one commercially available content browser provides for an extension programmed to force the loading of content from a selection of pre-determined Web sites using a specific browser. In this instance, the end user in control of the content browser provides an a prior determination of which content browser is best suited to handle content from a particular Web site. Another extension known in the art is programmed to respond to a manual command to use a specific content browser when rendering a selected Web page. Again, the determination of when to use the specific content browser to render the selected Web page remains with the end user.